OUTA says Dada Morero’s State of the City speech is out of touch with the lived realities of its residents.

The Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (OUTA) says City of Johannesburg’s (COJ) Executive Mayor Dada Morero’s 2026 State of the City Address exposed the depth of Johannesburg’s governance, infrastructure, and financial crises, despite repeated attempts throughout the speech to project optimism and stability. 

While OUTA welcomes the City’s more open acknowledgement of Johannesburg’s serious challenges, including a reported R220 billion infrastructure backlog, severe utility losses, and growing financial pressure, the organisation says the address highlighted an increasing disconnect between a mayor’s political messaging and the lived reality experienced daily by residents.

“The speech attempted to present Johannesburg as a city on a path to recovery, yet many of the City’s own admissions point to a municipality under severe strain,” says Julius Kleynhans, OUTA Executive Manager. “Residents living through collapsing infrastructure, water outages, refuse failures, billing chaos, and deteriorating roads are unlikely to recognise the picture presented in this address.”

Throughout the speech, Johannesburg was repeatedly described as a “performing city” built on a “solid foundation” and the tired slogan of a “world-class African City”. OUTA says these claims sit uneasily alongside the City’s own admissions around worsening water and electricity losses, financial instability, infrastructure decay, and ongoing service delivery failures.

OUTA is also concerned by claims around “record-setting response times” and same-day restorations during recent water crises. There are countless incidents of residents reporting infrastructure issues, which are quickly closed off as being attended to, yet remain unresolved. The mayor is reporting on false information.

Many residents across Johannesburg experienced prolonged outages, poor communication, repeated delays, and days without a reliable water supply during recent disruptions. OUTA says this reflects a broader concern around the growing gap between internal City reporting and the lived experience of communities across Johannesburg.

“Government performance cannot be measured through speeches or internal reporting alone,” says Kleynhans. “Residents judge government by whether the taps work, whether refuse is collected, whether roads are maintained, and whether basic services function consistently.”

OUTA also criticised attempts during the speech to frame reliance on Johannesburg’s public healthcare system as evidence of public confidence in service delivery.

The Mayor is suggesting that lower private medical aid membership in Johannesburg, compared to Cape Town, demonstrates that residents continue choosing the City’s public healthcare services.

OUTA says this conclusion is absurd and ignores the economic reality facing many residents.

“People often rely on public healthcare because they cannot afford private alternatives, not because they are satisfied with collapsing public systems,” says Kleynhans. “Many Johannesburg residents continue facing overcrowded clinics, medicine shortages, understaffed facilities, and deteriorating healthcare infrastructure.”

The speech also claimed the City is “at peace with labour”. OUTA says residents are entitled to ask at what cost this stability was achieved, especially on the back of agreements regarding future salary increases on the back of unfunded budgets.

Serious concerns have already been raised nationally around the affordability and sustainability of municipal wage agreements. At the same time, parts of Johannesburg continue experiencing refuse collection failures and operational instability linked to contractor non-payment and financial pressure within the City.

OUTA says Johannesburg’s crisis was not created overnight.

The organisation says the City’s current position is the result of years of poor governance, weak oversight, infrastructure neglect, political instability, and failed consequence management under successive administrations.

“Residents must now ask a difficult but necessary question,” says Kleynhans. “Can the same political leadership structures that contributed to Johannesburg’s decline realistically be expected to lead the recovery?”

OUTA also questioned the timing of renewed intervention discussions from the Gauteng Provincial Government.

The provincial government has had years to intervene meaningfully in Johannesburg’s financial and governance decline. Yet serious intervention discussions are now intensifying only months before local government elections.

OUTA says this raises legitimate concerns around political timing and accountability.

“If provincial authorities move to take control of aspects of the City shortly before an election, there is a real risk that governance and financial handcuffs are placed on any future administration that emerges after the elections,” says Kleynhans. “Long-term recovery plans cannot become politically timed mechanisms that avoid accountability for years of delayed intervention.”

OUTA says the repeated emphasis throughout the speech on “foundations”, “stability”, “partnerships” and “the Joburg we want to see” gave the address a strong election-year tone.

“Johannesburg residents have heard promises of renewal and turnaround for years,” says Kleynhans. “Increasingly, people are no longer judging government by speeches or slogans. They are judging government by lived experience.”

OUTA says Johannesburg remains critically important to South Africa’s economy and retains enormous potential. However, restoring public confidence will require far more than political messaging and future promises.

Residents and businesses want measurable delivery: functioning infrastructure, stable water and electricity supply, preventative maintenance, professional administration, financial discipline, and visible accountability for corruption and maladministration.

Johannesburg’s recovery will not be achieved through speeches, slogans, or war rooms. It will require competent governance, sustained implementation, and leaders willing to confront the consequences of years of institutional decline.

Supporting Documents

• A soundclip from Julius Kleynhas, OUTA Executive Manager, is available here in English and here in Afrikaans.